Balkan blues

Deepa reviews Western music for the Metroplus when she's not editing at the desk. She writes occasionally on Beethoven and Bach, reads non-stop on regiments and the Raj and loves to travel to places t...
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The Boriana Dimitrova Quartett's music melds Eastern melodies with Western jazz, writes Deepa Alexander. The concert, part of the Friday Review Music Fest 2011, is on November 5

This is music that promises to blend old memories and new sparks. The Boriana Dimitrova Quartett performs melodies drawn from a rich East European custom that for years was hidden behind the Iron Curtain. Named for the saxophonist and flautist, Boriana, who hails from Bulgaria, the quartet, now based in Germany, zigzags its way through the sounds of Bulgaria's folk music and lilting bagpipes to integrate Western jazz with Eastern harmonies.

Their pieces, therefore, are a dramatic contrast of saxophone purrs and punched riffs with the guitar, bass and drums waltzing through polymorphous tones and jazz swing.

The music is a deeply personal journey, unsentimental in tone and full of up tempo pieces that spur the spirit on.

Schooled in the classical piano and the oboe, Boriana found her calling in jazz and went on to graduate as the first female saxophonist in her home country in 1998.

Jakob Dreyer is one of the most prominent bassists in Hamburg and has been part of the German State Youth Jazz Orchestra, working with several international jazz musicians.

Lars Dahlke's first instrument was the trumpet before he became besotted with the electric guitar at 14. He divides his time performing with several jazz bands and working on film scores.

Drummer Niels-Henrik Heinsohn has been playing since the age of 12 and is a musician from the Bremen University of Arts and the Hamburg University of Music and Performing Arts.

At The Hindu Friday Review Music Fest, the quartet will perform pieces from their album ‘Balkan Blues'.